Football, fairy tales score Sunday

Pigskin powers Peacock; ABC rookie 'Once' stays hot

NBC racked up typically titanic ratings Sunday with its NFL matchup between the Patriots and Jets on ”Sunday Night Football,” but ABC matched its best result on the night this fall thanks largely to hot newbie ”Once Upon a Time.”

NBC’s stations averaged a preliminary 7.3 rating/17 share in adults 18-49 and 19.0 million viewers overall from 8:30 to 11 p.m. for the New England Patriots’ 37-16 victory over the rival New York Jets, with the final national averages expected to grow by roughly 10%. The game earned a 14.5 household rating in Nielsen’s metered markets, making it the fourth highest-rated ”SNF” game this season.

ABC welcomed back ”America’s Funniest Home Videos” (1.7/4 in 18-49, 7.3 million viewers overall), which had been preempted the previous two weeks; the vet hit season highs although it ran fourth in demos in an hour heavily influenced by football on the other nets. Fairy tale-themed rookie drama ”Once Upon a Time” followed at 8 p.m. as the night’s No. 1 entertainment series in demos (3.8/9 in 18-49, 11.3 million viewers overall), matching last week’s score and again providing a potent lead-in for ”Desperate Housewives” (3.0/7 in 18-49, 9.2 million viewers overall), which was up vs. last week. Also looking to be up was 10 p.m. drama ”Pan Am” (1.8/4 in 18-49, 5.7 million viewers overall).

Fox had an NFL overrun and post-game show ”The OT” leading into its comedies, with ”The Simpsons” (3.5/8 in 18-49, 7.5 million viewers overall) and ”Allen Gregory” (2.0/5 in 18-49, 4.2 million viewers overall) down a bit week to week, and ”Family Guy” (3.1/7 in 18-49, 6.0 million viewers overall) and ”American Dad” (2.4/5 in 18-49, 4.8 million viewers overall) roughly on par.

At CBS, Sunday bookends ”60 Minutes” (2.3/6 in 18-49, 13.2 million viewers overall) and ”CSI: Miami” (2.1/5 in 18-49, 9.8 million viewers overall) look to be up vs. last week, while middle hours ”The Amazing Race” (2.7/6 in 18-49, 10.6 million viewers overall) and ”The Good Wife” (2.0/4 in 18-49, 10.1 million viewers overall) are roughly in line with their week-earlier performances.